"Definitely not."
She took the dish from his hands and put it back in the sink. Grabbing a spare towel, she dried his hands off, a playful spark in her eye. She held his hands and used him for balance as she hopped away from the sink. She danced, or as close to dancing as she could get on one good foot. She swung her hips and rocked her arms, even raising their hands over her head and spinning in a circle.
"You’re gonna break your other foot."
"Nah. You’ll keep me from falling."
Tiffany snickered and pointed from the living room. She ran to them and grabbed their hands, forming a circle. Erica and Tiffany rocked back and forth and sang while Jack stood perfectly still, although he did have a smile on his face.
"I let the two craziest women into my life."
"Dance with us, Jack," Tiffany said. "It’s Katy Perry. She’s fun."
Jack was spared from further torment when the phone rang, cutting off the music.
"Thank God. Tiffany, go hit that speaker button for me."
Tiffany darted across the living room as he held onto Erica, taking the opportunity to draw just a little closer. He wasn’t a dancer, but watching Tiffany and Erica have fun was fun all by itself.
Tiffany activated the speaker. Jack had a good guess who it was.
"Hey, Victoria. How’s it-"
"I got through," she said to someone else. "Jack, I need some help. I’m at-"
The phone went dead, and Katy Perry again filled the living room. Only now the fun was gone.
Jack and Erica traded confused looks as he helped her to the bar. He retrieved his phone from the dock. Victoria didn’t call from her own phone. It was an unlisted number.
"That was Victoria, right?" Erica asked.
"Yeah."
"Do you know where she is? Got a flat tire or something?"
Victoria wouldn’t ask for Jack’s help over a matter such as a flat tire.
"I’ll go to her hotel, make sure everything’s okay. Would you mind watching Tiffany until I get back?"
"Jack?" Erica said. She held Jack’s gaze, sensing something more was going on than he was letting on.
"My sister gets in trouble every now and then. She helps people, and sometimes I need to help her."
"Don’t worry," Tiffany said, running to hug him. "Nothing can hurt Jack."
They were simple words from an excited child, but Jack could see in Erica’s eyes that she wasn’t dismissing them. Erica looked back and forth from Tiffany to Jack. She grabbed a crutch and made her way to the both of them.
"I know you’ve got secrets," she said. "But is everything okay? Seriously?"
He smiled. "It will be. And I’d like to fill you in on those secrets one day."
A half smile crossed her face as she leaned in to kiss Jack on the lips. Tiffany gasped next to them and jumped up and down.
"Jack and Miss Hernandez, sitting in a tree-"
Jack and Erica smiled as they broke their kiss, and he looked down at his daughter.
"You take care of her while I’m gone, okay? Don’t kick her cast or anything like that."
"I won’t, I promise."
"Good. Give me a hug."
He lifted Tiffany into his arms for a big hug. He kissed her on the cheek before setting her back down.
"Okay, you two behave while I’m gone. No wild parties." He winked at Erica. "See you soon."
CHAPTER 18
Jack stepped out of the hotel elevator and walked down the hall. He wasn’t on the fourth floor, but the second. Collins’ floor. He carried a spare key to Collins’ room that cost him a hundred dollars. There was no point in going to Victoria’s room. She wasn’t there, and the best way to find Victoria was to politely ask Collins what he was involved in.
Or not so politely.
He didn’t operate the same way as Victoria. She preferred to work from the shadows, only showing force when necessary. Victoria would kill if necessary, but she liked to leave people alive. He never understood why. She always claimed it was because she might need to revisit them one day. His theory was when Victoria spared a life it made her feel a little more human. Jack knew he left his humanity behind a long time ago, after many years without sleep.
Collins would tell Jack everything he needed to know, and then he would die.
Jack slid the key-card through the lock and gently pushed open the door. He scanned the darkened room as he stepped inside and closed the door behind him. The only light came from the street lights outside the window.
There was a man in the corner, in the shadows. He would have been invisible to anyone but Jack. He didn’t know who it was, but knew it wasn’t Collins. Whoever it was held a gun at his side.
Jack decided to play along, and stepped further into the room. The man raised his gun and shot Jack in the leg, a silencer muffling the sound. Jack fell to the floor, ready to let out a fake scream, when the man jumped on him and covered his mouth.
"Shhh. If you scream, I’ll kill you. Do you understand?"
Jack nodded.
The man used a remote to turn on the TV, giving the hotel room some background noise. He grabbed Jack’s shirt and threw him on the bed, and moved to turn on the light.
Jack looked into the eyes of a mortal male. Probably close to fifty years old, sharply dressed, a cold look in his eye. He pointed his gun at Jack.
"I’m gonna ask you some questions. If you want to live through tonight, you’ll answer them."
"Look, I just want to find Collins. Do you know where he is?"
He shot Jack in his other leg. Jack slapped his hand over the hole in his jeans and caught the bullet before it could roll to the bed, giving his game away. He let out a fake moan of pain.
"I said I’m the one asking the questions here. You’re the one who stole his data, aren’t you? You and a woman."
That single question told Jack everything he needed to know.
"Hmm," Jack said, leaning up slightly. "It’s making sense now. You probably kept tabs on Collins. You’re covering your tracks now. No doubt you killed the good doctor. That’s what I would have done. Now you need to see where his data went, and you’re hiding out here looking for a lead."
Jack stood up and brushed his clothes off. The man flinched at Jack’s lack of pain, and shot him in the shoulder. Jack didn’t hesitate as he took a step forward and kicked the man in the groin, sending him to the ground. He kicked him one more time and stomped on his stomach. The man tried to raise his gun through the pain, but Jack snatched the gun from his hand and grabbed a finger, bending it backwards. He pounced on him before his scream grew too loud.
"Now," he said. "It’s my turn to ask you some questions. But, I have to be honest, you’re not gonna live through tonight. You have no choice in that. You do have a choice in how you go. You can go quickly. You can go with no skin. Or we can get creative. I’ll find your family. Are you listening?"
He spit in Jack’s face.
"Fuck you-"
Jack grabbed another finger and broke it. He used the man’s shirt to wipe the spit from his face.
"The longest time it took me to break a person was twenty-eight minutes. I don’t think you’ll break any records. Let’s start with something simple. What’s your name?"
"Travis."
"Good. Now, Travis, I’m looking for a friend of mine, the woman you mentioned earlier."
"Some of our security team was trailing a woman. They ended up talking gibberish, not even knowing how they got where they were."
"She’s special like that. She called me tonight, and was ready to tell me where she was when the call went dead. So she is someplace. I’d like for you to tell me where."
Travis was silent, just a moment too long. Jack pressed the barrel of the gun into Travis’ palm and pulled the trigger. He covered Travis’ mouth as he cried and convulsed in pain. He admired the gun. Travis had thought ahead, bringing a silencer for the weapon.
"Listen very carefully. I don’t care what secret shit you
guys are in to. I don’t care about Collins. I certainly don’t care about you. I care about my friend. You will take me to where she is."
"If she got a look at Collins’ data, she might have found the facility."
"Now we’re getting somewhere. We’re gonna take a little drive. You’ll show me this facility."
"They’ll kill me."
"I told you. You already are dead."
"Then my last words will be fuck you."
Jack laughed. That was fairly clever. He stood up, keeping a foot on Travis’ stomach. He pulled out his iPhone and took Travis’ picture.
"What are you doing?"
"I’m sending your mug shot to some of my associates. They’ll have your last name in ten minutes. Then we’ll start rounding up your family and friends, anyone you’ve ever loved. They’ll be slowly tortured, and with this phone here we’ll be able to watch. I love technology."
"You’re...serious?"
"Always."
"I’ll...take you there."
"Smart choice. We’ll take your car, you drive. It’ll be fun."
*****
It took over an hour to arrive at their destination. Travis drove while Jack kept the gun pointed to his side the entire drive. Jack shook his head as they turned from the highway onto a dirt road and drove through the woods.
"It wouldn’t be a secret facility unless we drove to the middle of nowhere, would it?"
"The world’s not ready for what we’re doing," Travis said. "They wouldn’t understand."
"Is this government funded?"
"No. If they knew what we were doing, they’d shut us down."
The woods slowly gave way to a clearing, and a large fence up ahead. He saw the three-story building with lights throwing shadows over boxes and trucks. There was movement, figures walking in the darkness. He immediately recognized their gait, their sluggish movements.
"You have got to be fucking kidding me."
The ghouls perked up at the new noise. They sauntered over to the fence as Travis drove alongside. The smell of rotting flesh was thick in the air. Jack watched the ghouls as they pushed and clawed at the fence, breaking fingernails and tearing flesh. Some were old lab technicians, doctors, security guards. A few wandered naked in the herds.
"Oh God," Travis said. "I haven't checked in for a few days. Something’s gone wrong."
"Do you think so? This is what you idiots are working on? Ghouls?"
"The greatest weapon. A soldier that doesn’t really die."
"I’m guessing you don’t let them wander the yard like this?"
"No. Containment’s been broken. Fuck."
Memories from a hundred years ago flooded back as Travis pulled up to the main gate. Jack couldn’t help but wonder the source of these ghouls. Did they have a witch locked up somewhere, cooking up spells? Hope he hadn’t felt in a long time tugged at him, but he pushed it aside. If they had a witch in their possession, they wouldn’t need ghouls as a weapon.
The ghouls followed Travis as he parked and left his car, Jack a step behind. He followed Travis to a terminal, the ghouls reaching and snarling at them. Travis worked at the keyboard before an image of a security desk showed up on the monitor.
"Hello? This is Travis. What’s going on in there?"
He was answered by a ghoul walking by the desk. Its arm fell off as it walked down a hallway.
"Shit," Travis said, and switched to another camera. He didn’t bother speaking when he saw four ghouls eating a corpse. "They’re everywhere."
"Yeah, ghouls tend to do that."
Travis looked at him. "You act like you’ve seen this before."
Jack scowled as his last chance at salvation flashed through his mind. He saw the witch Annie lying dead, from Victoria’s hand, by the river, a town of dead ghouls a horse-ride away.
"Try another room."
Travis switched cameras once again, this time peering into a lab. At first Jack thought they were only more ghouls, but noticed a man in a lab coat pacing near a row of operating tables. A man and woman dressed in similar coats talked to each other near the back of the room. A smile stretched across his face when he recognized a beautiful redhead laying on one of the tables.
He pushed Travis aside as he leaned toward the microphone.
"Victoria?"
Everyone in the lab jumped and looked at each other. They all rushed to the terminal in the lab, Victoria winning out by shoving everyone back.
"Jack?"
"Are you having a little party in there?"
"You bet. I’m glad you could join us."
"Is this...magical?"
She shook her head. "Afraid not. This is our new friend, science and medicine, at work here."
A man with graying blond hair tried to muscle his way to the camera. "Who is that? Who the fuck are you?"
"Donaldson, if you don’t back up, I will beat you," Victoria said. "Jack, as you can see, this place has all gone to Hell."
"And I still say it’s all your fault," Donaldson shouted.
"Okay, so what’s going on?" Jack asked.
"We’re trapped, more or less. We’ve got maybe two hundred ghouls here total. I’ve been reviewing the video, and it looks like they got careless. This place was being destroyed when I got here. A scientist got bit, and you can guess what happened next."
He narrowed his eyes. "Actually, no, I can’t. This isn't the movies. Ghouls aren’t contagious. They eat the living, sure, but they don’t create more ghouls."
"Well, these ghouls do. This isn’t magic we’re dealing with."
"Alright, we’ll talk more when I get inside. What room are you in?"
"Go inside?" Travis interrupted. "I’m not going in there."
Jack smiled. Travis was very correct.
"We’re in lab 302. Third floor. Jack, I don't think they can hurt you, but there are still a lot of them."
"I know. Immune or not, I don't want fifty corpses pinning me down."
"How are you gonna even get in the gate?"
"I've got an idea about that. We'll talk in a few minutes."
"I'm not going in there," Travis repeated. "You're on your own on that one. I've taken you this far, I'm not taking you any further."
Jack studied the yard. He wasn't sure if the doors were locked or not, but didn't want to take the chance of hitting a locked door with a dozen shambling corpses behind him. There was an open office window near the corner of the building.
"You're right, Travis. You won't be taking me in there."
He raised the gun at his side and shot Travis in the leg. Travis screamed and collapsed to the ground. Jack climbed in Travis' car and pulled as close to the fence as he could. Travis was trying to crawl away as Jack left the car and stalked him.
"What are you doing?" Travis said.
Jack pulled him to his feet and dragged him onto the roof of his car. The ghouls moved to their position along the fence and moaned at the scent of fresh blood.
"There's one more thing you can do for me," Jack said.
"No, please, no." He cried as Jack had him halfway over the fence. Two ghouls grabbed him by the shirt, but Travis had a solid grip with his one good hand. "It's not human."
"Neither am I."
Jack kicked Travis' fingers, and over the fence he went. Ghouls came from all directions as they converged on Travis. He screamed in agony as they feasted on him, ripping and pulling. Jack calmly moved the car down another twenty feet along the fence and used the roof to scale the fence.
He walked at a steady pace across the yard. If he ran, he knew he'd catch the ghouls' attention. They were thoroughly engaged in their meal, and he wanted to keep it that way.
He pulled himself into the office through the open window. The office was dark and had been torn to pieces. He nearly tripped over a dead body as he made his way to the door. A man in a shirt and tie lay on the floor, an empty wine glass in one hand and a gun in the other. He'd taken his own life with a bullet to the temple, a wise decision. J
ack had tried the same thing many times over the decades, just to see if mankind's advancing firearms could break his curse.
Cracking the door open slowly, he saw two ghouls wandering near the end of the hall. A stairwell was across from him. He grabbed the dead man’s gun, adding it to the weapon he took from Travis. After taking a nervous breath he crossed the hall and entered the stairwell. He had no doubt he was immune to the bite of a ghoul, but didn’t want to drag thirty of them to lab 302.
The moans above told him he wasn’t alone in the stairwell. As he passed the door for the second floor he ran into two of them, wandering on the stairs. One lunged for him, a ghoul wearing a torn suit. Jack easily dodged its grasp and dumped him down the stairwell to the floor below. The second ghoul grabbed Jack’s arm and bit down hard. He winced in pain for the moment it lasted, and then struck the ghoul in the head with the butt of his gun. He nearly shot it, but didn’t want to make any more noise than necessary. Wrenching his arm away, he simply kicked the ghoul in the knee, shattering it. The ghoul buckled and fell down the stairs, landing at a strange angle near the landing.
Jack opened the door to see two dead bodies against the wall across from him. Lab 302 was just ahead, near a hallway intersection. He heard the moans, but didn’t see any ghouls nearby.
The door to Lab 302 was locked. He lightly knocked on the glass window and saw a flurry of movement. A woman tried to unlock the door, only to be stopped by a man.
"Do not let him in here!"
"Victoria said he’s okay. He’ll help us."
"Fuck Victoria, that monster."
"Donaldson, get out of my way."
"We’re doing things my way. We’re not listening to a bloodsucker."
Jack raised an eyebrow as a scuffle broke out behind the door. There was a ghoul around the corner, judging from the moan. The door finally flew open, and a hand pulled him in by the shirt and locked the door behind him.
A few of the lights in the lab were out, leaving pockets of darkness. Examination tables and equipment were everywhere. The man Jack recognized as Donaldson leaned against the wall with a bloody lip. A man and woman stood together not far away, looking beat up themselves. Torn lab coats, circles under the eyes, blood on their pants.
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